Cooking: 3-veg and halloumi bake

no meat in sight...

(In lieu of an introduction: There are plenty of documentaries on TV showing the risk to the food supply if we continue to eat meat at the rate we do. While I don't intend (yet) to become vegetarian/vegan, I am conscious of the unsustainability of eating meat (and to a certain extent dairy products, for that matter) at the current rate. During a recent such episode shown on BBC, I was appaled to see in real terms (i.e. in actual meat mass) how much we consume on average. The conclusion, to which I fully agree, is straight-forward: the only sustainable solution requires a large reduction in the quantity of meat we consume. Eating less meat will put less pressure on the planet, is more healthy and will also promote a better farming system - improved animal well-being, and less but better-quality meat for the carnivores among us.)

All this to say that I've been trying more and more meatless recipes to reach this decrease in my own consumption of meat: I give you a heart-warming, vegetable-packed, rough but oh, so tasty bake! 

Moby Dick: A whale of a readalong!

Yep, I have to drag myself back into the art of reading and writing about it -- plus, I've wanted to read Moby Dick for a very long time.  No time like the present, and RoofBeamReader's invitation was hard to resist.

For my reading, I plan to use two modes:  my wonderful hard-bound copy purchased at the well-known English bookstore Shakespeare and Company in Paris, that's bound to bring back happy memories of a spectacular bookstore and a well-read personnel, ready to help with all types of requests...

and ...

The podcasts from Moby Dick Big Read, which, back in 2012, I would religiously wait for to download because I worried they would disappear.  Fear not, the site still exists and it is a once-in-a-lifetime chance to hear beautiful voices read each chapter (and marvel at the artistic interpretations).  I plan to use these podcasts on my daily walks and hope that the combination of listening and reading brings me to the 15 pages per day RoofBeamReader suggests...

Join the readalong - a great way to start the summer!

The Making of a Marchioness, by Frances Hodgson Burnett

I'm always amazed at how some of the themes currently at the height of interest were also touched upon by classic books. Case in question The Making of a Marchioness, by Frances Hodgson Burnett.  Written in 1901, it talks of financial peril, marriage of convenience and death plots for inheritance purposes...  

I came upon it  having watched "The making of a Lady" (I assume because the title of Marchioness is not well-known), a slightly rom-com set in a Victorian context - easy for a gentle afternoon watching, while knitting / cross-stitching / petting your cat, or whatever Victorians would do in the afternoon...

Recipe: grilled vegetable quiche

While I am an absolute carnivore, there are times I yearn for an abundance of vegetables.  

I will then go through phases of "vegetarianism", where I (re) discover the tastes and smells and colours of the vegetable family.  In such cases, it's always good to have a good source of inspiration:  in my case, it's Yotam Ottolenghi and his book "Plenty".  

Plenty recipes to choose from, but this vegetable quiche is one of my favourite staples.

Youth, by Isaak Asimov

Coming back from London on a Saturday evening, the world quietens down on board the Eurostar train.  People close their eyes, contemplate the events of the day, and try to enjoy the peace around them.  This is a time when I enjoy a good read: nothing too elaborate or big - just simple, good writing and a reasonable length to last the journey.

Such a read is Youth, by Isaak Asimov.  Written in the 1950s, it is of the futuristic genre but with no fanfare.  It rather reminded me of the Twilight Zone programme that I so enjoyed in my own youth...

The plot is fairly straightforward:  life in a distant future, where our present and recent past is considered as the "beforethewars" era (I really enjoyed that word, nothing fancy but leaving so much to the imagination...).  The main characters involve two scientists, who try to take up contact with aliens in a foreign planet, with the view to take up trade relations. Already I'm amazed at the little bits of wisdom that I read in between this simple story:

... was it reasonable to destroy almost all their tremendous civilization in atomic warfare over causes our historians can no longer accurately determine?

With them, we get to see their respective sons, longing for a future of their own, preferably in a circus.  They in turn discover some uncommon-looking creatures they think could be their ticket into this wonderful life - so they keep them in a cage and try to take good care of them.

The book is short and more than enough for the 2-hour travel to Brussels.  I really enjoyed the language used, but also some of the messages used.  While waiting for a signal from the aliens, the two scientists start debating about whether the aliens could in fact be hostile.  The pessimist of the two explains why he sees things this way:

The world has been at peace too long.  We are losing a healthy sense of suspicion

Linking it with the Twilight Zone, I came to a point where the twists are non-ending - who's watching whom here:  the scientists the children, the children the little creatures, or the children the scientists who are in truth the little creatures?  One can come to their proper interpretation of the story, but one thing is certain:  for such a tiny size, this book certainly stayed in my mind long after I had read it...   

The Classics Club - Spin No. 4

The Classics Club is organising a spin again!  A list of 20 classics to read, all ordered in a nice list, and on Monday, there will be a spin, and whichever number is picked, this book I'll read by January 2014 - Let's go!

My Spin list, by order of feeling:

My dreaded

1.  D.H. Lawrence - Lady Chatterley's lover (I've read it once, and found it boring...)
2.  Goethe - Faust (I'll either  love it or hate it...)
3.  Sueskind - Das Parfum (I've seen parts of the movie, and I was slightly nauseous...)
4.  Kafka - Der Prozess (I really don't know what to expect here...)
5.  Nietsche - Also sprach Zarathustra (why are 4 of my dreaded ones German???)

My desired

6.  Rushdie - The Satanic verses (finally, to read what the whole fuss was about...)
7.  Angelou - I know why the caged bird sings (both desired and dreaded, I hope it turns out     to be great!)
8.  Shakespeare - Taming of the Shrew (ohhh...)
9.  Sophocles - Οἰδίπους Τύραννος (Oedipus Rex - a classic masterpiece)
10.  Conan Doyle - Sherlock Holmes: Scandal in Bohemia (we all need a little scandal now and then...)

My oh well, whatever...

11.  Shelley - Frankenstein (can you believe I haven't read this?)
12.  Shakespeare - Othello (no comment)
13.  Camus - La chutte (I have no idea what to expect)
14.  Zola - Nana (leftover from Zolaaddiction...)
15.  Darwin - On the origin of species (I have to read this at some point...)

My free choices

16.  Swift - Gulliver's travels (I've been meaning to read this ever since I was a child)
17.  Orwell - Animal Farm (a re-read, one of the books that have left a mark on me)
18.  Christie - Murder at the Vickarage (a little whodunnit never hurts)
19.  Miller - Death of a Salesman (I've seen the play quite a number of times, I need to read the book..)
20.  Wharton - House of Mirth (I didn't like the first book of hers I read, so this is my second try)

I'm really curious to see which book I'll be reading - what fun!



UPDATE:  Spin number is 10 -- Scandal in Bohemia, here I come...